[Discuss] Eclipses Re: Great talks last night, however...

[rlk at alum.mit.edu (Robert Krawitz)]

On Sun, 23 Jul 2017 16:59:08 -0400, Richard Pieri wrote:
> On 7/23/2017 3:42 PM, grg wrote:
>> Nor do those characteristics describe millions of homes and buildings.  How
>> many buildings do you think are destroyed in Kansas by tornados each year?
>> Hundreds, for a survival rate of 99.99%.  So no, it's not because cows are
>> running away from approaching tornados or because they're sharing Farmer
>> John's storm cellar, it's actually because 99.99% of the spots in Kansas
>> don't have a tornado land on them.
>
> The size of a home or even a large barn in rural Kansas is a tiny
> faction of the size of a 150km^2 (say) power station. Rural homes in
> Kansas are spread out dozens to hundreds of kilometers apart. So when a
> tornado touches down the chances of hitting a given home is small and
> the chances of it hitting several is practically nil.
>
> Unless it hits Topeka.
>
> That 150km^2 power station? That's the size of Topeka which got
> clobbered by a sequence of tornadoes in 1966.

If a tornado takes out one part of a solar power station, the rest is
still usable.
-- 
Robert Krawitz                                     <rlk at alum.mit.edu>

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